


Dawn

by vardas



Category: Criminal Minds
Genre: Gen, Prompt Fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-19
Updated: 2012-05-19
Packaged: 2017-11-05 15:09:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/407869
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/vardas/pseuds/vardas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Fill for Criminal Minds prompt meme six</p>
<p>Seaver seeking help/advice with nightmares</p>
            </blockquote>





	Dawn

She doesn’t sleep on the way home. She knows they already see her as the weak link, a chink in their armor – they must, because she does, and the BAU team includes some of the most startlingly self-aware individuals she’s ever met. They’re also kind enough to simply nudge her awake if they hear her whimper in her sleep. But this night isn’t a whimper, it’s a scream she can already feel creeping up the back of her throat, carried on the coppery tang of blood; and to sleep now would set it free. So she doesn’t, meticulously filling out her report as soft snores fill the cabin.

“You asked about your father, earlier.” Spencer settles into the empty seat beside her. She hadn’t even heard him move. “Even as a trainee, you have access to the case files, which leads me to believe you are in search of something less objectively rational.”

“I – yes.” If she finds their team leader sternly intimidating (she does), and feels a slight desperation to please Agent Rossi (sadly, also true), it is Dr. Reid that leaves her the most helplessly overwhelmed. It’s easy to attribute that authoritative air to Agent Hotchner’s years in command, and her hero worship of David Rossi is possibly the most ill-kept secret in the FBI. But Agent Reid is at once her closest peer chronologically, and her polar opposite in terms of intelligence and ability. It’s unfair to compare herself to the man’s genius and find herself wanting, and certainly he’s made no attempt to show her up. Of course, it’s not as though he’d had to try. She’d made herself look incompetent without any effort on his part at all.

Dr. Reid is frowning slightly, and she realizes too late that she’s been silent for long enough to pique his interest. “There’s no need to do your report on the plane. Hotch won’t expect everyone to be finished until tomorrow at the earliest.”

“I know. I just . . couldn’t sleep.”

“Oh.” Reid leans back, rubbing his thumb along the inside of his left elbow. “It’s natural to compare this unsub to your father. I’m sure that’s what Emily said.” He sighs. “She also said not to mention that.”

Ashley smiles a little. Dr. Reid might be a certified genius; but tactful he is not, and she likes him more for the lack. “It’s all right. I just didn’t want to have a nightmare and freak everyone out.”

“Rossi’s nightmares decreased in both frequency and intensity after solving one of his cold cases. Morgan’s, too, though his case was personal, not professional. Hotch’s changed, after Foyet, turned him from victim to unsub.” Reid’s eyes are shadowed. “Emily never talks about hers. Even Garcia and JJ have them, though they go into the field less frequently.”

“What about you?” She expects him to say the Hankle case. The fact that an agent’s abduction and torture had been captured on film made it unique. The unholy things that happened to the member of her class who had tried to hack the system and view it had turned it into a legend. Rumor had it, Jackson still couldn’t get so much as a credit card. Having seen the BAU technical analyst in action, Ashley suspected that Penelope Garcia could explain a great deal about Jackson’s problems.

“I dream about being weak enough to want to forget.”

She sees the flash of a gold coin before his fingers close over it, hiding it from view. “How do you keep doing this, if you can’t forget the horrible things you see?” The crime scene photos are already blurring in her memory, and abruptly she remembers that Dr. Reid has an eidetic memory. A thousand images like the ones today that will never fade, and she wonders how he’s managed to hold on to his sanity.

“You remember. When you want to quit, when you start to think that one more hideous thing might push you over the edge, you remember the ones who live because you do. And when even that isn’t enough, you remember a promise, and wait for dawn.” He presses the coin he holds into her hand, warm from his touch, before returning to his seat at the front of the jet.

Ashley turns her face to the window, and waits.


End file.
